Bihar polls Phase-2: 37 million voters set to decide fate of candidates

Tejashwi Yadav slams EC for not releasing genderwise voter data after Phase-1 of elections

The final phase of Bihar Assembly polls on Tuesday will have 1,302 candidates, including over half a dozen ministers in the Nitish Kumar government, in the fray across 122 of the 243 seats with 37 million electors eligible to vote.

 

The polling for first of the two phase elections took place on November 6 on 121 seats, with a voter turnout of 65.08 per cent, which the Election Commission (EC) termed to be a historic all-time high for Bihar.

 

Votes will be cast at 45,399 polling stations, of which 40,073 fall in rural areas. The EC has made elaborate arrangements to make the voting experience comfortable and to ensure that electors turn up in equally good numbers.

 

 

Amid criticism of the EC by Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader Tejashwi Yadav for “not disclosing” the male-female data of the first phase of the Bihar assembly polls, its officials on Monday underlined that the gender-wise turnout ratio is generally given at the time of final turnout.

 

At a press conference in Patna, Yadav claimed that the EC provided the gender-wise data earlier after the conclusion of each phase. Yadav also claimed that altogether 208 companies of security personnel from BJP-ruled states have been deployed in Bihar for poll duties.

 

“Around 68 per cent of police observers are from BJP-ruled states. Why is it so?” he asked.

 

Responding to the allegations, EC officials said nearly 80 per cent of the police forces are deployed from the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) and only about 20 per cent of the police forces are deployed from the state armed police (SAP) which are drawn proportionately from different states according to their availability.

 

The districts going to polls on Tuesday include West Champaran, East Champaran, Sitamarhi, Madhubani, Supaul, Araria and Kishanganj, and all these share borders with Nepal. Several of the seats in the Seemanchal region have a significant population of Muslims.

 

The second and final phase is also important for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and smaller constituents of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA).

 

Of the 101 seats it is contesting as part of the alliance, 57 of the BJP’s candidates are in the fray in the second phase.

 

The second phase will also see contests on all six seats of the Hindustani Awam Morcha, headed by Union Minister Jitan Ram Manjhi, including four of its sitting seats.

 

Rashtriya Lok Morcha’s candidates include Snehlata, wife of party chief and Rajya Sabha MP Upendra Kushwaha. Four of the six candidates fielded by the party are going to the polls in the second phase.

 

The INDIA bloc parties would be hopeful of winning seats in the Seemanchal region, and have tried to offset the increasing influence of the Asaduddin Owaisi-led AIMIM and fielded its heavyweight leaders for campaigning, such as Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav.

 

The AIMIM won five seats in 2020 in the region, and also hurt the prospects of the Opposition alliance in some other seats.

 

In the 2020 Assembly polls, the BJP, which had won a total of 74 seats, won 42 of these 122 seats, followed by RJD, which won 33 seats (out of its total of 75), Janata Dal (United) won 20 (of its total of 43) seats, and Congress 11 of its total of 19 seats.